RE: uranium in drinking water

[Rodney Bauman <RBauman@wssrap.com>]

What's the explanation for the U-234/U-238 ratio of 2.3?  One might expect
such a discrepancy at concentrations near the MDC (i.e., due to counting
statistics), but not at hundreds of pCi/L.  I would seriously question this
data due to this inconsistency.

Rodney Bauman, CHP, RRPT
rbauman@wssrap.com 

-----Original Message-----
From: Charp, Paul [mailto:pac4@cdc.gov]
Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2000 8:12 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: uranium in drinking water


We have been involved with this situation for about a week.  The uranium
data we have received thusfar is that the uranium analysis was performed by
gamma spec with the following results listed as pCi/L:

U-nat     758 +/- 140  mda 0.8
U 235    7 +/- 2         mda 0.5
U 234    512 +/- 95    mda 0.8
U 238    224 +/- 42    mda 0.7

the total alpha was measured at 882 pCi/L with no indication of the method
used for this analysis

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